Ms Mary Hurley:

I will come in on some of the issues and I will ask Mr. Rafferty and Ms Ryan to come in as well. Regarding the presentation of the numbers, and the needs of 37,000 households being met by HAP, 350 tenancies per week are being added under the scheme. We are seeing it work well for people and we are seeing people in secure tenancies that are lasting. Some do not and where that happens, we try to work through the place finder to find them other accommodation. However, people are having their housing need met by HAP and they are comfortable within that group. There are 86,000 households on the waiting list and we are targeting those most in need. They are the priority people. For us, the 86,000 are the people on waiting lists. People on HAP are in houses and homes that are secure. That is where I am seeing it from.

I will work through some of the issues the Deputy raised. On the choice-based letting, we are all in agreement it is a great scheme and it works well. While it has been rolled out in all areas, it is operational and fully working in only 16 of them. We are working with the other local authorities to make sure it is fully rolled out. Cork and south Dublin are great examples of how it works. It is agreed that choice-based letting is a good scheme and it is something we are trying to encourage local authorities, in which it is not fully operational, to operate.